He stared in profound amazent, wishing soone else were with him to share this strange and magnificent sight. A question ford in his mind: Do they possess emotions analogous to our own? And if this is just a small part of their world, what must major centers like New Cairo be like? And why do the combat robots appear so fundantally different from the civilian models living in this small part of Egypt? Ares beca lost in thought, contemplating how to confront creatures of such intelligence and creativity. He felt their chances were slim, but they might increase exponentially if he could gather the rest of his companions with their own strange abilities. For now, he had to focus on his objective. He glanced at his watch and saw he had two minutes until his power wore off. He knew that if he didn’t find a place to hide, he would be in grave trouble.
He crossed the ornate streets, realizing he was walking not on asphalt, but on a transparent, shatterproof material. Beneath it, conduits of blue energy flowed throughout the city, creating a breathtaking and vibrant spectacle. Ares understood that these conduits were what powered them, what animated them. He scanned the city with his eyes, trying to locate their source, but he could not pinpoint it.
All in good ti, he told himself. Right now, I must focus on rescuing Sairi and Ivanov, getting out of here, and then, perhaps, I will try to obtain so of their intelligence if I can.
The soldiers marched on, carrying their strangely shaped silver weapons. Ares held one as well, knowing nothing about it other than the ideal way to grip it. The soldiers turned right, and he turned with them. He could now see their path clearly: they were heading toward the massive, planet-shaped building. They made a series of turns until they reached it. Ares glanced at his watch and saw that two minutes remained. A tremor ran through his body as he imagined the scenario where his disguise failed and he was discovered, but he pushed the thought from his mind. The soldiers stopped abruptly before the entrance, and a hemispherical gate opened upward. He heard a strange electronic sound emanate from it, which he did not understand, but he followed the soldiers into the spherical building.
Ares was astonished by the building’s architecture. It was adorned with mosaics, its copper-colored walls covered in strange inscriptions and symbols. High above, nurous strange panels he couldn’t comprehend circled ceaselessly, depicting what looked like a great war. Another image showed diverse and strangely shaped robots, and there were pictures of cities, places, and planets. He couldn’t take in all the images that circled within the strange, hollow do of the spherical building because he was moving too quickly and couldn’t raise his head for long without arousing suspicion. In the center of the spherical space, a large blue crystal radiating energy hung from the ceiling. It appeared to levitate on its own, unaffected by any surrounding force, emitting energy downward through the glass conduit. Ares followed the conduit with his eyes and saw, in the middle of the building, a strange object: a large, round, glass generator. The tube connected to it, pumping energy through other glass pipes that erged from it, distributing power to the entire city. Ares understood: this was the power source, this strange blue crystal.
The soldiers reached a strange door. One of them pressed it, and it opened. They all filed in, and the door closed behind them. The small glass room they had entered began to descend. He knew at once it was an elevator. Through the glass, he saw they were descending underwater through an insulated transparent tube. He also saw a large white building ahead, protected from the water by a glass do. He almost gasped at the sight, but he understood it was an undersea facility, or beneath a river, or whatever body of water they were descending into. The white facility glistened within the glass do, and fish of all kinds and colors swam around it in a srizing display, while the lights of the facility provided the only illumination in the dark ocean.
The elevator reached the bottom, at a glass bridge leading to the facility. The soldiers exited, carrying Sairi and Ivanov, and began to cross the bridge with steady, organized steps. Ares walked behind them, trying to keep his own steps and movents identical to theirs.
After they crossed the bridge, which was enclosed in a large glass tube connecting the elevator to the facility’s gate, they stopped. One of the robots approached an electronic panel and entered a strange code. The gate began to open, and they quickly entered.
Ares glanced at his watch and saw he had ten seconds left. As soon as he was inside the facility, he swiftly broke from the formation and hid in a corridor to his left as the robots continued down a long white hallway. Ares stood panting heavily, his form having reverted to its original state. He scanned his surroundings carefully and found that it looked like the corridors of a hospital, or perhaps more like the tower where he had been held captive. After catching his breath, he quickened his pace and headed down the corridor the robots had taken.
He looked down the hallway and saw the robots turning right at the end of it, leaving it completely empty. He quickly followed them, pulling his pistol from his pocket and attaching the sound suppressor; he might need it in a situation like this. The Enix cloak was proving very useful for this infiltration mission. He continued on and turned quickly, seeing the robots still proceeding down the corridor ahead. He followed them cautiously, hoping that none of them would turn around or notice his absence. After a few more steps, they turned left into another empty white corridor. He leaped silently and followed them around the corner, only to find the hallway lined with nurous glass windows on his right and left. He advanced slowly and cautiously, crouching low so as not to be seen. He approached the first glass window and found that it overlooked a room that resembled so kind of laboratory.
Ares raised his eyes to inspect the room, and his jaw fell open in horror and disgust. He saw robots wearing official scientist uniforms, dissecting several human corpses. The scene was sickening and terrifying. One was opening a human’s brain and examining it with strange instrunts, making incisions here and there. Another was opening a person’s stomach, removing the viscera, and placing it inside another unknown device, the analysis results appearing on its screen. Ares saw every part of the human body being cut up and subjected to experints of all kinds. He saw empty husks of bodies hanging everywhere. He ducked his head, fighting the urge to vomit, and forced himself to move on. He looked into another window and saw other robots performing experints on living humans, subjecting them to electricity, water, heat, and all manner of tests as they scread and begged for help. Behind them, computers recorded results and numbers in a strange language.
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